


Molten Lava Cake

by Arsenic



Series: Discipline and Punish [50]
Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alternate Universe - Prison, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-02
Updated: 2007-12-02
Packaged: 2020-03-29 23:15:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19029931
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arsenic/pseuds/Arsenic
Summary: Mikey the Matchmaker.





	Molten Lava Cake

Right before Pete had gone out on tour, he'd given Mikey the key to his apartment and said, "Keep my practice bass company, yeah? It's like a plant, man, it'll die if nobody plays with it."

Mikey had said, "I think you mean a dog." Pete actually had a dog, but he didn't have plants, so Mikey saw where he could get confused.

"Whatever."

Mikey didn't use the key when Pete was in town. He would come over, but he knocked and waited for Pete to answer the door, like any normal person. Pete of course, always said, "What, your key isn't working? Or you just wanted to make me get off my ass?"

Mikey kissed Pete's cheek and said, "How's the tour going?"

"Oh, you know, Patrick misses Chris, Andy's trying to get Joe to cut back on the pot in order to boost his immune system or some shit like that, Hemmy's decided that he likes to eat my picks. So, pretty awesome."

Mikey laughed. Pete asked, "How's my girl?"

By "his girl" Mikey had learned that Pete was asking about his bass, whom he called Clandestine. Mikey thought that was a pretty androgynous name, but he probably would have named his bass Bunny and considered it a boy, so he wasn't really one to judge. "I had to replace three strings in the first week you were gone. What the hell do you do to her, Wentz?"

"We have an intense relationship."

"Yeah," Mikey said. "Speaking of--"

Pete groaned. "No, no, no. No speaking of."

"Going that well, huh?"

Pete fell back onto his sofa and curled up into one very disgruntled ball. "Can I-- This is sort of personal, what I want to ask."

Mikey reached out a hand and Pete looked at it for a second before taking it. Silently, Mikey tugged Pete up and through his apartment, into the empty room that was meant to house guests, but mostly just housed all of Pete's band-related detritus. Mikey picked Clan off her stand and hooked her strap over his shoulder. Pete sidled up behind him, wrapping his arms around Mikey's torso like he sometimes did, strumming at Clan, throwing off Mikey's tuning. Mikey didn't mind. It wasn't like he was in a hurry.

Pete wasn't Frank, but the ink and compact heat at his back and the way Pete always just had a little too much energy for his own good allowed Mikey to pretend for just a second. Then he made himself focus. "You wanted to ask me something?"

"Just, how do you-- I mean, you don't even get to _see_ \-- Nevermind, I'm an asshole."

Pete sort of was, at times, but it was part of what Mikey liked about him. Or rather, Mikey loved that he was forever trying to be better. It was novel and something Mikey could appreciate. "We write letters."

"That's...old fashioned."

Mikey smiled at his lap. "He doesn't have a cell phone and I can't afford texting."

"No, I just-- And you know, like, you know for absolute sure--"

"Nothing's for absolute sure."

"But you've been waiting over three and a half years."

"Some things are pretty close," Mikey admitted.

"I just-- I can't even find my way to ask him out on a date. Not that I would even want him to be monogamous while we were out, because that's just not where either of us are, really, and it would be stupid and a sure way to fuck things up, I'm pretty sure, but even just putting it out there seems--"

Mikey put his hand over Pete's and squeezed. "Pete."

Pete was silent for a while before saying, "I haven't given a shit in a while. After Brian, things were just, y'know, whatever. A good time. And that's fine, that's great, mostly, but sometimes I remember the way I used to actually want to hear the things Brian had to say, the way it was like being with Patrick or Andy or Joe but there was just that something a little bit better, and it's stupid, but sometimes I just kind of want to be in love and have the other person maybe feel that way, too."

"Yeah, stupid," Mikey said softly.

Pete shoved at him a little. "You know what I mean."

"Pete?"

"Yeah?"

"Tell him it's lonely out there. On the road. See if he gets it."

"That's it? Just, 'it's lonely out there, Matty B'?"

Mikey strummed at the strings gently. "Just that."

"You have, like, the worst advice ever."

Mikey smiled to himself. "We'll see."

 

*

_Frank,_

_~~Do you ever pretend that I'm there? I mean, maybe not there, because well, it's~~ _ ~~there,~~ _~~but somewhere where you are?~~ Nothing smells just like you. The detergent isn't right, or the soap or the toothpaste or anything. Not even the ones you used._

_I've been using The Beatles to work with some of the kids at the hospital on their coordination. Early stuff, more conventional. It's good, because the parents can relate to their children through the music, and there's good beats and it's just really useful. I always wonder if they know that people are using their music for that sort of thing. Like, Gee was telling me that there are artists whose works are used to help trauma patients because of the colors and that sort of thing, and he wonders what that would feel like, to know that your art is actually_ healing _someone. Gerard's art kinda heals me, but I don't think that was what he meant. Still, I think it would be pretty cool to find out._

_Mizzy has figured out how to work the doors in the apartment. None of us are sure how, because she totally does not have opposing thumbs, I swear, but the other night I got home from the hospital and Bob was kind of limping and Gerard had to tell me how she got into the room at a really inopportune time and evidently was protecting Gerard from_ Bob _of all fucking people. Bob, luckily, did not kill my dog. Actually, he seems bizarrely relieved that she'll at least protect Gerard when the chips are down. Bob is kind of my hero at the moment. I had a long talk with her and then Gerard had a locksmith come and put locks on the bedroom doors._

_My dog is totally the smartest dog on the planet._

_Mikeyway_

 

*

Mikey came up on Greta from behind because he could do things like that with her and she would squeak, maybe, but she wouldn't scream or yell or be frightened. Today she just hit him mildly with a spatula and scolded, "Mikey Way," even as she smiled at him and reached over to hand him an oatmeal cookie. Mikey grinned at her. "How's it going?"

"It'd be better if you had an extra hour to help serve. Chris is still down with strep."

"Poor guy," Mikey said. "Yeah, I think I can fit that in. Will you give me a ride to the hospital before clean up?"

"Also, a kidney," Greta promised.

"Oh good, I needed an extra one. Can I steal Alex for ten minutes?"

"Twenty, if you can get him to actually eat lunch."

"Yeah, okay."

Mikey stole Alex away with a, "We need to talk about Tommy," a glass of water and a plate of ceasar salad, compliments of Greta. He grabbed some of the bread Alex had just pulled out of the oven and stuck it on the side of the plate. Alex followed hungrily and while repeating different versions of, "Is Tommy okay?" over and over.

Mikey set the two of them down at a table and said, quite calmly, "Alex, look, I don't think Tommy's ever going to get up the nerve to ask you out."

Alex choked on a sip of water. Mikey handed him a napkin and waited for his distress to die down. Then he continued, "Well, maybe eventually, but there's a chance you might have moved onto greener, or at least easier, pastures by then, and I think that would kind of suck. So you should say something about how there's a restaurant you really like or a movie you wanna see or a place you like to go for walks, or I don't even fucking know, but something, and take him out on a date."

Alex looked at Mikey for a long moment. "I thought he was straight. He was kinda clear about that, and I mean, I sorta try to respect--"

"Ever been to prison?"

Alex blinked. "No."

"Trust me when I say that being gay here, around this place, is pretty different than it is in there. And Tommy's fucking embryonic, okay? Like he's even had time to know what the hell he is. Just, look, I'm really not an asshole, not for the most part. I wouldn't be telling you to ask him out if I thought it was going to end in pain and misery."

Alex concentrated on his food for a bit, and Mikey let him. After a while he said, "I've just been someone's experiment before, you know? And I kind of-- No, I really like him. He's hot as fuck and he gets what it's like to really love making something and he's fun to hang out with and I really fucking like him, so it would pretty much suck if he had a homosexual freak out over me and we had to stop being friends."

"Sometimes it's really not about homosexual so much," Mikey said. Alex just looked at him, so he continued, "He really likes you, too. He does."

Alex speared at the lettuce angrily with his fork. "Fuck," he told Mikey. Mikey patted his shoulder consolingly.

 

*

_Mikeyway,_

_Nothing is quite the same temperature as you, or has the same slipperiness at the end of its sentences. I have known this for a long time._

_When you said Gerard put locks on the doors, you meant the plural, right? Because if she got Bob, she'd totally eat me. There wouldn't even be scraps left._

_Zack got into an argument over the make of certain Harleys with Dirty the other day, and I ended up somehow being his wingman, and amazingly, some throwaway comment I made about engines and coolants--don't ask, I couldn't remember if I tried--won the argument. Luckily, Dirty forgets shit after about ten seconds, he literally has the memory of a goldfish, but it was a little sketch there for a couple of minutes. I made Zack promise never to get me involved in brand warfare ever again. Then he corrected me, because it can't be brand warfare if we're all arguing about the same brand. Yeah, my bad._

_Is the weather ever going to get cold again? It's a fucking inferno in here. Winter feels like a long lost dream. Especially January._

_Frank_


End file.
